Christopher Whiteside MBE is the Conservative County Councillor for the Egremont North & St Bees Division of Cumbria County Council. The division includes St Bees, Bigrigg, Wood End, most of Moor Row, the Western part of the Mirehouse area of Whitehaven, and surrounding countryside.
Chris lives and works in Copeland with his wife and family.
Chris is a former member of Copeland Borough council, and an Honorary Alderman of the City and District of St Albans.

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Storm in a teacake ...

Scottish Nationalists are angry.

They are angry that Tunnock’s, a Scottish company who have been making excellent teacakes for 61 years and often (but not always) uses the Scottish Lion rampart, has dropped the Scottish symbol of a lion rampant from its logo for a new teacake advert on London Underground.

Worse, Tunnock's have made the SNP even more annoyed by using the word "British" in the advert: they referred to their product as "The Great British Teacake" in what was obviously meant as a humorous reference to the Great British bake-off programme, but annoyed the SNP's self appointed "Ministry of Truth" squad because "British" is an unapproved word.

That's because a very mild form of EVEL (English Votes for English Laws) came into effect for the first time in the House of Commons today. See report here.

Contrary to what you might think from the ire and fury of SNP rabble-rousers who have been complaining bitterly about this, it does NOT mean they don't get a chance to vote on measures only affecting England and Wales because the equivalent legislation in Scotland has been devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

What it does do is add an additional hurdle which laws for England or England and Wales, on issues which have been devolved in Scotland, has to pass, that such laws need majority support among MPs representing the area they effect.

So today there was a debate and was due to be a vote on the Housing and Planning bill for England and Wales which only involved MPs for England and Wales,

Effectively this very minor form of devolution for England and equalisation for Wales - which I fully support - is NO THREAT WHATSOEVER to the people of Scotland. It does not mean that a measure without majority support in the UK parliament could get through on English votes by banning MPs for Scotland from voting, because there will also be "readings" for all laws which still need to get through the whole House of Commons. The Housing and Planning Bill for England and Wales will not become law without having passed a number of stages, and in all the Commons stages other than today's, MPs representing Scotland can vote.

So basically this is giving England, or England and Wales, a veto, not complete devolution, or remotely as strong as the degree of independence devolved to the Scottish parliament, on issues only affecting those areas. It's a right not to have things imposed on England which is similar to, but does not go as far as, what the SNP have demanded for Scotland for decades.

I have Scottish ancestry and am proud of it. I am not in any way anti-Scottish and neither is this legislation. There is no good reason for the SNP to protest in this way. The SNP members who are screaming about this very mild form of EVEL are acting like silly and hypocritical children. They are no more grown up than their friends who are picketing cake shops.